harvested data from dozens of high-poverty schools, schools where at least 40% of the students qualify for government-subsidized lunch. >> we looked at about 40 different variables, and we put that into a big statistical analysis and said we want factors that are highly reliable and also yield a large number of kids in trouble. >> narrator: and within this chaotic tangle of data, the team found something revealing. >> and basically out of this mix, four came out really strong. and that was our sort of eureka moment. i saw kids waving their hands, saying, "help-- help me stay on track." >> narrator: the data showed that if a sixth-grade child in a high-poverty school attends school less than 80% of the time, or fails math or english, or receives an unsatisfactory behavior grade in a core course, that absent effective intervention, there is a 75% chance that they will drop out of high school. >> it may seem far less than rocket science, but it's something that in fact schools by and large have not paid attention to. >> a 90, a 91... >> narrator: schools have long collected statistics on absences, behavior and of